Ours Were The Lighthouse Towers
by sharinat
Summary: "That's what dads do. They're not perfect, and sometimes they're embarrassing, or infuriating... But at the end of the day, if they can be bothered to try, they're always able to understand what's in their kids' hearts. That's the one superpower they really do have." Post-Shiva one-shot.


**Spoilers**: Season 10, specifically Shabbat Shalom/Shiva, tiny one for You Better Watch Out

**Warning**: Deals with aftermath of (non-major, canon) character death.

**Author's Note: **Regarding Tony's age when his mother passed away – in earlier episodes, he apparently refers to her being around when he was 10, but in 7x12 Flesh and Blood, it is said that she died when he was 8. Since that's the most recent canon, that's what I'm going with.

**ours were the lighthouse towers  
**_by sirah87_

_how would you know, when everything around you is changing like the weather of a big black storm?_

_and who would you turn to? _

_oh, had I a ghost, a shadow at the most, would you let me know?_

_cause I don't want to trouble your mind with the childish design of how it all should go,_

_but I love you so._

_when it all comes clear and the wind it settles, I'll be here, you know,_

_cause you said ours were the lighthouse towers._

- gracious, ben howard

Darkness has fallen outside NCIS headquarters, night laying a heavy blind against the building's plate glass windows. Inside, the overhead fluorescent bank lighting is dimmed. It infuses the bullpen with a warm glow as its beams bounce gently off of orange-painted walls. For those few agents still rattling around at this hour, the complete blackness beyond their small, mutely lit enclave could, and perhaps should, be isolating. For the most part, though, it brings only a comforting sense of insulation from the rest of the fast-paced, topsy-turvy world. Peace, found a step out of time.

On a normal week, Tony would relish in this stolen moment. He would wrap himself up in the stillness and allow the almost perfect silence, punctuated by the steady hum of technical equipment and broken only by the _snick snick snick_ of a nearby keyboard, to calm the day's racing thoughts.

But five nights ago, Eli David died. Was murdered.

Three nights ago,Ziva boarded a flight to Israel, intent on laying her father's body to rest.

And tonight, Tony's mind is incapable of slowing down; there is no sanctuary to be found in the suffocating vacuum of the nearly abandoned squad room. His skin feels too tight, his unsettled bones in disarray beneath the surface. Under his desk, his left leg bounces in an unconscious effort to release some of the anxious energy threatening to explode from deep within his chest. If Gibbs were here, he'd have snapped out a "Quit it, DiNozzo!" long ago; if McGee were here, Tony would be on the receiving end of irritated sighs and pointed glares. Maybe a long-suffering, "Tony, would you cut it out?"

And if Ziva were here, well…Well, then maybe the way her face had crumpled, there in the middle of the Vances' living room, wouldn't keep replaying like a heartbreaking film clip every time he closes his eyes. Maybe he wouldn't be caught in a tailspin of worries and what ifs and frustrations at his own powerlessness. Maybe Eli would still be alive.

If Ziva were here, maybe it would be a normal week.

* * *

The third stair from the top creaked just like it always did, announcing his arrival.

"Boss, you down here?" A needless question: the basement lights were on, and he could hear the faint clinking of metal against glass as Gibbs rummaged through one of his ubiquitous mason jars. It felt better to speak than to continue walking down the stairs mutely, though, frayed at the seams as Tony was. Like maybe the sound of his own voice could help hold him together. "I kind of hope you are, 'cause otherwise I think someone might've broken in. Probably Abby, trying to figure out how you got that boat out again. Abby, are _you _down here?"

He trailed off as he reached the landing. Gibbs was at his workbench, back turned, digging through an upturned pile of assorted screws and bolts. Without outwardly changing focus, the other man asked, "You done?"

"Done, Boss."

Gibbs held something up to the bulb hanging over his head, and, after squinting at it for a moment, gave a satisfied nod. He moved toward the table at the centre of the basement, asking, "Ziva get on her way alright?"

At the question, an invisible hand clenched at Tony's windpipe so hard he didn't even bother to wonder how Gibbs knew he'd gone to see her off. He opened his mouth to respond, jaw hanging uselessly for an awkward second before he managed to fight past the tight grip cutting off his air supply. "Yep. She and Shmiel are probably enjoying some in-flight cocktails and figuring out if he's a summer or a fall as we speak."

Gibbs' expression, as he set down the item he'd just retrieved and met Tony's eyes for the first time, let him know beyond a doubt that the lighthearted front had been a disastrous failure. Finding himself pinned by a gaze somewhere between compassion and disturbingly intense contemplation, Tony shifted his weight from one foot to the other. He tried looking away, studying the mysterious configuration of rounded wood pieces laid out on the table's surface, but he could still feel Gibbs' stare boring into him.

When the scrutiny became too much, Tony found himself saying, "I went home after I left the airport, but my place was too quiet. And since you're always such a chatty Cathy I figured I'd swing by. See what was shaking at the Batcave. Gibbs-cave, if you will."

Gibbs absorbed the rapidly fired onslaught, then commented, "Kinda late for a social visit, isn't it, DiNozzo?"

It was, he knew. Half past midnight was a stretch for even Gibbs' open-door policy. But when Tony had arrived at his apartment, there had been sheets folded and piled neatly on the end of his couch, and a few glasses drying upside down on a towel beside the sink. There had been a note in familiar handwriting saying Kate had been fed earlier that afternoon because she'd seemed hungry, and a extra towel hanging on the back of his bathroom door. Everything had felt off, in a way it never had before. Strangely empty.

And so he'd come here.

Now, though, Tony was remembering it had been a draining few days for everyone. Wondering if maybe he should've just stayed at his place instead of letting his own agitation interrupt Gibbs' chance to decompress, too.

"I can go," he said, taking a step back only to realize with a start that, the entire time he'd been there, he'd never moved from the bottom of the staircase.

Gibbs shook his head, the left corner of his mouth curling upwards. "Stay awhile," he said. "I cleared off a seat for you." He nodded toward an empty chair at the edge of the room, conspicuously free of either carpentry supplies or the omnipresent layer of sawdust.

"You don't mind?" Tony asked.

"Only if you're gonna keep asking stupid questions," Gibbs said. "Bourbon's on the bench."

* * *

Somewhere across the field of cubicles another late-working agent clears his throat. The noise, a harsh and phlegmy _ahem_, is jarring, amplified by its hushed backdrop. Tony is torn between frustration at the interruption of his tattered focus, and the desire to yell "Gesundheit" just to keep the oppressive quiet from returning.

In the end, he merely sighs, rubs a hand over his tired eyes, and slumps back in his chair. He feels the knots between his shoulder blades gasp a single, painful death rattle before the tension slowly begins to bleed from his muscles. He stares athis computer screenin defeat, watching the cursor blink at him insistently from a blank report template. Then, as it's been all evening, his gaze is inexorably drawn to the empty workstation across from him.

He thinks about how he'd told Ziva, _"You're not alone."_

He thinks about how she'd said, _"I know."_

And he sort of hates Israel - has enough bad memories of that particular country to last a lifetime - but he finds himself wishing, fleetingly and then not-so-fleetingly, that he'd been able to get on that plane with her.

Just in case she needs to hear the words again.

* * *

The next night a nail-free mason jar was waiting for him on an unused sawhorse, two fingers of amber liquid in the bottom.

"Mine?" Tony asked, even as his fingers wrapped around the glass.

Gibbs glanced up from where he was checking the dimensions of a long plank. He deliberately looked from Tony to where an aged, chipped mug sat on the table in front of him. Taking this as an unspoken _duh_, Tony twisted his lips into a grim parody of a smile. "Cheers, then."

The first mouthful of bourbon burned on the way down, lighting his raw nerve-endings on fire. He finished it off in a second, inelegant gulp.

"Planning to drink me out of business tonight, DiNozzo?" Gibbs let his measuring tape close with a _snap_ and turned to grab the half-full bottle of Gentleman Jack from the workbench.

"No, Boss," Tony said hoarsely. He held his glass out for the proffered top-up.

"You gone home yet?"

"Nope." He'd left Jackie's wake after an hour and headed straight back to the squad room, hoping work might clear his head. At the very least, he'd thought it might provide something to concentrate on beyond the weighty sadness that seemed to have attached itself to every cell of his being. It was possibly his worst idea in a long and storied history of poor decision-making, because upon one glimpse at the Israeli flag in Ziva's pencil holder he'd superimposed her face over Kayla Vance's, and all chance of successful distraction was lost.

Gibbs replaced the bottle then settled into the chair Tony had occupied the previous evening, grabbing his own mug of artificial comfort on the way by. "Anything you want to talk about?"

And _wow_, _I must look as strung out as I feel if Gibbs is offering to talk_. "Not really," Tony responded aloud. It was the truth – he wasn't sure he could put what he was feeling into words. Didn't entirely understand how he could be simultaneously so exhausted yet so keyed up.

At Gibbs' raised eyebrow he took a sip of bourbon, smaller this time, and leaned back against the sawhorse. Undoubtedly his coat was getting dirty, but he didn't really care. It'd be awhile before he could stop viewing as funeral attire, anyway.

"Anything we _need_ to talk about?"

_Probably_. He shrugged.

* * *

It's a relief when his desk phone rings. He tears his eyes away from the spot where Ziva should be and grabs the receiver, tossing out an automatic, "Very Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo!" as he picks up.

"Tony." His name trips off the caller's tongue, its two syllables sounding almost as startled as he feels to have the familiar voice unexpectedly in his ear.

"Ziva," he says, freezing. His upbeat office persona crumbles away beneath the weight of a thousand thoughts all clamouring to escape at once. Like _is everything okay? _(of course it's not) and _I miss you _(would that be weird to say?) and, inanely, _I think my fish likes you better than me (_he swearsKate's been sulking at the bottom of her bowl since Ziva left). Unable to sort through the bottleneck, he repeats her name then waits for her to rescue him.

When she does, the attempt is almost as clumsy as anything he might have tried. "I did not expect you to still be at work."

Tony side eyes his cell, which, as far as he knows, has lain lifeless next to his keyboard for hours; no missed call light winks up at him. She'd clearly tried this number first. Unsure how to interpret that contradiction he ventures, "Well, you caught me."

A sigh gusts through the earpiece in response. "It's late there," she says, seeming to become more certain of herself as a hint of exasperation creeps into her tone. "I will never understand why you like going in at this hour."

He lets himself smile a little, because he's always enjoyed an annoyed Ziva, and also because he's now certain she'd known he was likely to still be at NCIS, opposite claims aside. "It's even later in Israel," he points out. "3 a.m., if my math is right."

It is - he added Tel Aviv to his world clock app the night Ziva left.

After a short pause, she says, "I can't - it is difficult to sleep. The noise of the city, it's…" He can't see it, but he knows her free hand is spinning in a tight circle as she tries to find the right phrasing. "It is not what I'm used to, anymore. The area around my townhouse is much quieter. And this mattress is terrible."

"Too soft?" he asks curiously.

"Too hard," she corrects. "It is like sleeping on a stone slab. Abby's coffin is probably more comfortable."

"I'm sure it is, but I can ask McGee tomorrow if you want a firsthand witness report. Have him send you his official statement through email."

"The funeral is tomorrow," Ziva says. "I do not expect I'll be around a computer, much."

He sobers at that, sourness slowly settling into his stomach as he realizes just how _hard_ she's trying to convince him – and probably herself – that it's not a big deal. "Ziva..." _Are you all right? _He wants to ask, but doesn't. He still remembers being eight years old and hating those four words, resenting everyone who uttered them. When you lose a parent you're not all right.

She ignores the echoes of his incomplete idea, tramples over them by inquiring, "How _are _McGee and Abby?" as if this were just another phone call between friends trying to catch up with each other's lives.

It's an obvious deflection, a little too loud, a little too bright. He could easily press the matter. Maybe he _should_. But at least Ziva had been the one to reach out, and if what she thinks she needs right now is a casual conversation it's not really his place to argue. So he leans further back in his chair, props his feet up on his desk, and tries to give her that.

"They're fine. McGee has a date tonight, I think. Some girl he met today on a coffee run? I'm not really sure, he didn't seem to want to give me many details."

"Hmm, I cannot imagine why."

"That's what I said! But what can you do, our intrepid McGeek has a suspicious mind."

"He's entirely too paranoid," Ziva agrees, tacking on as an afterthought, "Do not forget to check his coat pockets for ticket stubs or receipts. Maybe you could learn something from them."

"I won't," Tony promises. He's reluctant to indulge in another grin, but can't do much to stop it. "I'll be wishing you were here to snatch his phone for me, though. You're better at getting past his guard."

"I'll be back soon."

"I'll hold you to that." Because it comes out with a more serious edge than he'd intended, he quickly goes on to say, "Everyone else is fine, too. Abby's been plying us all with baked goods. I think she tried to get Gibbs to give her the emergency key to your place so she could leave some in the freezer...I don't know what the Boss' verdict was, but don't be too surprised if you now have enough snickerdoodles in there to last out a zombie apocalypse."

"A zombie apocalypse."

"Abby made a lot of snickerdoodles." Ziva's probably frowning, now, line forming just so between her eyebrows as she tries to parse out how the two are connected. The mental image is almost as good as the real thing. "In other news, Boss is building something new in his basement."

"Another boat?" she asks.

Tony swipes a pen form his keyboard tray and flips it across his knuckles one way, then back again, and considers. "I don't think so. Seems like he's working on something smaller this time."

"I see…and how are you, Tony?"

"Well, I've been better. I found a new patch of gray hairs, today. It really threw off my morning." He's pleasantly surprised when this makes her chuckle, short but genuine. Alone in the bullpen, he gives himself permission to feel just a little bit of pride in that.

"I am sure it only makes you look more distinguished," she says, sounding amused.

Neither of them says anything more for a bit. He twirls his pen and listens to her breathe steadily over the line as the comfortable lull drags on, until, distantly, he can hear what might be rustling sheets. The creak of a mattress.

"Think you can sleep, now?" he asks. "Did my story about McGee's love life bore you enough that you're ready to fall into a coma, stone slab or no? Because even I yawned a couple times during that one."

"I…" Ziva hesitates. "Maybe. But I should let you go, anyway. You'll want to get home."

"I'm not in any rush."

"Still, it is long past time to say goodnight."

She still doesn't say it, though. The quiet between them stretches taut. Tony exhales. Feels kind of like he's teetering on the edge of a cliff clutching a parachute he's not quite sure how to operate. Decides to jump anyway.

"Ziva. Why did you call?"

She takes so long to respond that he begins to think she's not going to. Then she's blurting "I do not know what to say" as if the admission has been desperate to burst free ever since he'd picked up the phone.

"For…the eulogy?"

"Yes." It's said tightly, accompanied by sharp intake of breath that ends in a wounded, choked off noise.

"Ziva," he says, in hardly more than a whisper. _Oh, Ziva. _He casts about for something – anything - to say that could help her, could make this better, but finds nothing. "Did you talk to Shmiel?"

"Yes. All he told me was to 'speak from my heart.' But –" Another hitching breath.

His own throat aching in sympathy, Tony prods, "But?"

"But nothing I can think to say is right."

"It doesn't need to be perfect, Ziva. No one's asking you for that."

"I am asking it of myself!" she snaps.

He meets her head on, demanding "Why?" but is unprepared for the bitterness, the self-loathing, that drips from the answer she immediately throws back at him.

"_Because_, Tony. Because despite everything I know about how the world works, about life and how quickly death can take it away, I am still just a silly little girl who never figured out her father wasn't invincible until it was _too late_." Ziva stops and swallows hard.

Tony waits.

When she resumes, the venom is drained away, replaced by regret and the smallness that comes from feeling absolutely and horribly lost. It isn't much of an improvement, but it is better. "Every daughter imagines her father to be a hero. Perfect, untouchable…and even though it has been a long time since I have thought of my father as a knight in shining armor, or anything so naïve, I never really believed anything bad could happen to him." Her voice breaks on the last word. She cuts off, composes herself. Soldiers on. "And now it has, and all I can think is that he died before I had a chance to - I don't know, not apologize. But - let him know I loved him? Despite everything. I don't think he knew. And so yes, this eulogy needs to be perfect, Tony. Because it is my last chance to tell him."

"He knew," Tony says firmly. She audibly scoffs.

"If you'd seen his face…"

"He knew. Ziva, that's what dads do. They're not perfect, and sometimes they're embarrassing, or infuriating, or have sex with your cougar neighbour. But at the end of the day, if they can be bothered to try, they're always able to understand what's in their kids' hearts. That's the one superpower they really _do_ have."

Ziva gives a ragged laugh that's painful to hear. "Mine was not exactly father of the year."

"I'll give you that," Tony says. "But even though Eli might not have won any awards, he came here because he was trying to be someone you'd be proud of. He wanted to be your dad again, that guy you used to look up to and adore – and don't even try to deny it, David, because I know a daddy's princess when I see one."

She laughs again, but this time it's less broken. More like the sound of someone trying to hope.

"Okay?" Tony asks.

"Okay." A minute ticks by. Two. "Tony?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you…remember how your mother smelled?"

"No." It's hard to realize details like that are slipping away from you. That you can no longer recall a loved one's scent, or their laugh. Tony hasn't thought about it in a long time, but now that he does, he finds it still hurts.

Ziva says, "Neither do I. Or for Tali," and falls so silent that at first Tony is unsure whether she'd plans to continue. At length she does, with an underlying, steely resolve that suggests she's struggling to make herself forge ahead. "What if I forget how my father smelled, too? If I can't tell my grandchildren, or even my children, anything about him but that he died the Director of Mossad?"

There are a lot of things he could say to that, reassuring platitudes he could offer. He could tell her that she's older now than when she lost her mother and Tali, and that she'll probably be able to recall more about Eli. Suggest that she'll always have stories about him, and recent memories, that won't fade as easily. Admit that he hasn't spent much time thinking about her father's scent, but that if he had he'd have bet on a combination of gun oil and mystery.

None of these are the option he chooses.

Instead, Tony says, "Tell me. I'll remind you."

A second goes by. He hears Ziva's mattress squeak again, followed by a _click_, and then she's saying, "Citrus. And cloves," and he releases a gust of air he didn't know he was holding.

"Got it. Consider it in the vault. You going to turn in?"

"I think so. Good night, Tony…and thank you."

"'Night, Ziva."

* * *

After they hang up, Tony spends an hour completing the report he'd spent the past six trying to start. Riding high on the victory of successfully rationalizing why it had been necessary to slam a suspect's face into the steering wheel of his getaway car (in a way that doesn't amount to "I was troubled by my graying hair, and also Ziva is upset and I don't like that either" - which, if he's being honest, did play a larger-than-acceptable role), he packs up his stuff and sends the night guards a chipper "Bye guys, keep it real" on his way out of the building. He figures Gibbs would want to know Ziva checked in, so when it's time to go left or right, he turns his car left.

"Hey, Boss," he calls, clattering down the stairs noisily.

"That your impression of an elephant?" Gibbs asks, expression wry. He's sitting, sandpaper in one hand and a small piece of wood in the other.

"I didn't think I had the element of surprise, anymore…" Evidently, he'd been right. The mason jar is back on the sawhorse, filled, apparently awaiting Tony's arrival. "I thought I'd try the shock and awe approach. Did it work?"

"Oh, there's awe, alright."

Tony wanders over to the sawhorse and takes his place leaning against it. "I think there was an implied insult, in there. But I'll choose to ignore that." He picks up the jar so he won't accidentally knock it over, but forgoes drinking from it.

Gibbs rolls his eyes, then goes back to his task. Tony takes the opportunity to observe the assemblage of shapes on the central table. Idly, he tries to figure out what they're going to be once everything comes together. Wonders if Gibbs will tell him, should he ask.

Before he can inquire, the man himself states, "You seem better."

He _is_ better, Tony realizes. More balanced, more at ease, than he's been in nearly a week. "Ziva called." The steady rasp of sandpaper stops and he hastens to add, "I told her about McGee's secret lady friend. We conferred, came up with our snooping strategy. Nothing like plotting against the Probie when he can't defend himself to turn a mood around."

"Sure that's it?"

If Tony deliberately misunderstands, well, there's no proof. "We also chatted a bit about Abby, how things are in good ol' Israel. Apparently, Ziva's not overly fond of her mattress. I didn't tell her about the steering wheel thing, though – and, now that I mention it, if we could just keep that between us -"

"Tony."

He stops mid-sentence. Finally notices Gibbs is looking at him.

"Is Ziva all right?"

Tony makes himself slow down, and chooses his words with care. "Not yet. She will be."

"Good."

They sit companionably for a while, Gibbs intent on his work while Tony makes increasingly wild guesses about his newest project. The glass of spirits warms under the skin of Tony's palm as the shadows outside begin to crowd evermore closely against the dingy basement windows. Ensconced safe within a pool of defiant light, he lets himself sink further into a welcome sense of well-being.

Eventually, when he's sure that the spell won't be broken, Tony asks, "Are you planning to pick Ziva up from the airport?"

Gibbs fixes him with an unreadable stare. After a beat, he shakes his head, lips pulling into a not-quite smirk, and returns his attention to the now perfectly smoothed wood in his hands. "Nope." He blows a cloud of sawdust into the air and adds: "Thought you were."


End file.
